Information about the Aspen Ideas Festival is here. I am scheduled for a session, The American Wellness Paradox, currently scheduled from 11:00-11:50 a.m., at the East Lawn Tent. This will be a discussion with senior HHS policy advisor, Calley Means. Here’s the blurb on it: “Americans are spending more than ever on healthcare, supplements, wellness trends, and “clean eating,” yet rates of chronic disease and metabolic illness continue to climb. As skepticism fuels the rise of movements like MAHA, debates over what Americans should eat have become deeply cultural, political, and economic. Two influential voices with sharply different perspectives on nutrition and food science explore how food systems, farming practices, consumer culture, and the wellness industry collided to create one of the defining public health debates of our time.”
by Marion Nestle
Sep
25
2008
How much melamine is harmful?
The European Food Standards Agency has done some calculations. It says the Tolerable Daily Intake (TDI) is 0.5 milligrams per kilogram (mg/kg) body weight. This means that for a young child weighing 10 kilograms (22 pounds), it would only take five of those candies mentioned in the previous post to hit the TDI.
But the Agency also says that Chinese infant formula contained as much as 2500 mg of melamine per kg. Let’s assume that a scoop of formula weighs 10 grams and contains 25 mg melamine. If a child has several feedings a day, this amount of melamine could easily exceed the TDI and, apparently, did. And remember: if cyanuric acid is present, kidney crystals can form at even lower doses.
